Mass protests against femicide are reaching a tipping point in Mexico

Two more atrocious crimes had to happen in Mexico City , in the heart of a country where ten women are murdered every day on average, for the women to say enough is enough, and demand society and authorities a real change against gender violence . They will march in the capital and other cities on Sunday ; on Monday, they will stop their daily activities for a historic first time .

Mass protests against femicide are reaching a tipping point in Mexico

Amid the violence related to drug trafficking and organized crime often associated with corruption in the government, police, judicial system, and the corporate sector, that left in 2019 a record of 34,582 deaths according to official figures, the unstoppable increase of femicide rates has been documented since hundreds of women and girls , mostly workers from maquiladoras (in-bond assembly industry), were victims of unknown aggressors in the border city of Ciudad Juárez 30 years ago.

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The straw that broke the camel’s back this year was the atrocious femicide of Ingrid Escamilla , 25, whose body was skinned and dismembered by her partner Erick Francisco on February 8.

Months before, she denounced him for domestic violence at the local Attorney-General office, yet the process was archived because Ingrid decided to give Erick Francisco an opportunity.

On February 17, relatives identified the body of Fátima Cecilia Aldrighetti Antón , a seven-year-old child reported missing nearly a week before in the rural southern municipality of Tláhuac. Fátima was kidnapped by Gladis Giovana Cruz Hernández , who had temporarily lived with her family, in order to bring her husband Mario Alberto Reyes Nájera “a young girlfriend” as he demanded, threatening to sexually abuse her two sons otherwise.

Mass protests against femicide are reaching a tipping point in Mexico

Fátima was tortured, abused, and finally suffocated with a belt by the couple, who abandoned her remains in a bag.

Sad and gruesome stories as the previous ones are not rare, without attracting national and international attention. Even in Mexico City , few are aware of the use of the river Río de los Remedios , turned long ago into a sewage canal, as a dumping ground of human remains.

In a 2018 interview with UNAM Global , Mexican journalist Lydiette Carrión underscored that “one never knows where the [authorities'] incompetence ends, because they could be overburdened, and where investigation collusion or interference begins.”

Carrión said that only in 2014, forensic personnel recovered 40 human remains, 39 corpses, and 6,000 skeletal remains in the river.

Misogynist culture

“We are a femicide society . To make it a reality, the only thing required is a culture, a system, that allows it and fosters it. A misogynist culture , a continuum of macho culture that goes from street harassment to teenage pregnancy , and domestic violence , ending with criminal gangs dedicated to kidnap teens, sexually torture them, and kill them,” added the author of the book La fosa de agua. Desapariciones y feminicidios en el Río de los Remedios (Debate, 2018).

Femicide

grew by 137% in the last five years in Mexico , where 1,006 cases were classified as such in 2019. Unfortunately, it is clear that the response from the federal and state governments has been insufficient . This week, EL UNIVERSAL reported that cases increased last year in 13 states, despite judges ordered the pre-trial detention of 117 men suspected of femicide , following Congress’ decision to extend the catalog of crimes that merit this punishment.

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María de la Luz Estrada, director of the National Citizen Observatory on Femicide , affirmed that harsher punishments of the alleged culprits, as sending them immediately to prison, does not inhibit the commission of the offense, urging to modify the strategy to combat crime.

To make matters worse, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador ( AMLO ) and high-level collaborators emanated from academic and leftist sectors have accused the organizers of the Sunday protest march —coinciding with the 45th anniversary of the International Women’s Day ,—and the national strike #UnDiaSinNosotras ( #ADayWithoutUs ) of launching an “attack” on his government, saying that opposition “conservatives” have turned themselves into “ feminists .”

Used to trying to control the public narrative through his daily morning press conferences, AMLO —who often blames the past neoliberal governments for Mexico’s problems—declared after the femicide of Ingrid Escamilla that the issue was “manipulated” by some media outlets which “take advantage of any circumstance to generate defamation, distortion, and false information campaigns.”

Afterwards, he presented to journalists a brief “Decalogue against gender violence ,” that resulted widely criticized by activists due to its vagueness and lack of differentiation between types of violence .

Nevertheless, on Tuesday he considered himself “an expert” on gender issues, while Secretary of the Public Service Irma Eréndira Sandoval stressed on Twitter: “ Feminism will be anti-neoliberal or will not be”.

It is possible, however, that AMLO is right when he says that the movement constitutes an attack on his administration since the United and Organized Feminist Assembly highlights in its call for the march a series of demands against precariousness of the labor force, outsourcing, layoffs in the public sector, land dispossession, mega-development projects, and the National Guard, features that characterize the current government.

In an assessment of the procedures of gender violence alerts, the National Commission on Human Rights observed that the persistence of inequality gaps represents a brake for women’s development, as well as to the access, enjoyment, and exercise of their rights, due to the reinforcement of structures that put them in vulnerable position and subordination.

“As well, represents triggering factors for the generation and aggravation of contexts of femicide violence , linking cultural, social, political, economic, and normative elements that directly or indirectly allow discrimination by gender reasons, and that tolerate and sustain violence on women,” the assessment remarked.

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In the country, 13 gender violence alerts have been declared since 2015 in several municipalities on the same number of states including México , Nuevo León , and Veracruz , according to the National Women’s Institute ( InMujeres ). The public body added that in seven times authorities ruled out declaring the alert due to the update of “sufficient objective elements;” there are also nine requests for a declaration of alerts.

As part of multilateral efforts against the scourge, the United Nations and the European Union are working with Mexico through the Spotlight Initiative , focused on eliminating all forms of violence against women and girls . The initiative got its name as it brings focused attention to this issue, moving it into the spotlight and placing it at the center of efforts to achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment , in line with the 2030 UN Agenda for Sustainable Development .

Six UN agencies are participating in the program since May 2019 with a budget of USD $7 million distributed to six areas, with the specific goal of designing public spaces in which women and girls feel secure.

The Spotlight Initiative will last four years and is implemented in close coordination with the Mexican Foreign Affairs Ministry , the Interior Ministry , the National Commission to Prevent and Eradicate Violence Against Women , InMujeres , state and local governments, civil society organizations, and the EU, operating in Ciudad Juárez ( Chihuahua ), Chilpancingo ( Guerrero ), Ecatepec , and Naucalpan ( Estado de México ).

Editing by Sofía Danis

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